This year, with a thumping profit of $281 million, staff expected something similar.

Instead, the Communications Workers Union has branded Mr Fahour a Christmas Grinch, after he decreed the staff bonus would be a $100 voucher - to be spent at Australia Post stores.

Adding insult to injury, full-time staff will get in the mail 100 60¢ stamps (part-timers will miss out). Mr Fahour has said in a briefing to staff that the vouchers and stamps will begin arriving in the mail this week.

The Communications Workers Union said this year's Christmas bonus is thrown into stark contrast by Mr Fahour's own salary: of $2.77 million he received last financial year, $874,000 was a cash incentive payment. This, the union argues, is a rather large bonus.

Asked about this year's bonus payment to staff, Australia Post's general manager of external affairs, Jane McMillan, said that while Australia Post had delivered strong results, ''the outlook for the business remains challenging''.

''Continued mail volume decline and the need to invest $2 billion in our parcels and retail network means we will continue to keep our costs constrained,'' she said.

Joan Doyle, a state secretary of the Communication Workers Union's postal branch, said Mr Fahour had seen his bonus increase by a third last financial year. Meanwhile, the Christmas bonus decided on for all of his staff would fall, in some cases by 80 per cent this year, Ms Doyle said. ''Mr Fahour doesn't mind calling on our members to work harder and longer every year, but when it comes to rewarding them he turns into the Christmas Grinch,'' she said.